The Democratic Alliance entered this budget with a clear call for a pro-growth, pro-jobs agenda that would ease the cost of living, cut red tape, and stimulate investment. What we needed was a credible plan to move the needle on unemployment, restore economic confidence, and support struggling households. Instead, what Finance MEC Mlungisi Mvoko delivered was a speech full of recycled promises and vague ambitions, with no clear roadmap to get our province working and growing again.
Expanded Public Works Programmes and youth employment initiatives may temporarily pad job statistics, but they do not create long-term, sustainable employment. These are stopgap measures, not economic strategy. Likewise, the R200 billion in investment “pledges” remain just that: promises on paper, not money in the bank or businesses on the ground.
Despite repeated calls for urgent red tape reform, the budget offers only vague commitments, with no details, no deadlines, and no metrics for accountability. The province’s fiscal foundation continues to weaken, with R506.8 million being drawn from reserves to plug budget shortfalls. This move highlights the ongoing failure to generate meaningful provincial revenue or implement the recommendations of past revenue studies.
There is still no plan to reduce the bloated Cost of Employment (CoE). The CoE now consumes more than 66% of the total budget, far above the 60% ceiling that the province itself previously set as a target.
Yet there is no plan in the budget to begin reducing it. No staff rationalisation, no review of bloated structures, and no effort to shift resources back to frontline service delivery. If the CoE was in line with the 60% target, savings of close on R6 billion would be achieved, which would more than cover the current R2.3 billion shortfall, eliminating the need to dip into provincial reserves.
Simply managing our CoE would free up revenue to fund new infrastructure, support economic growth, or expand service delivery.
The MEC’s admission that there is a syndicate of employees defrauding government, as if he and his colleagues in the executive are not part of government and have no power to do something about it, speaks volumes.
The Department of Health, which faces spiralling accruals, receives billions without a single mention of how the department will stabilise its finances, improve billing, or curb waste. Without structural reforms, this will remain a bottomless pit.
The fact that we are again relying on provincial reserves to fund budget gaps proves this government cannot manage its core fiscal responsibilities.
In the face of rising crime, the Community Safety budget has increased by a mere R11 million, a figure that borders on contemptuous given the scale of the crisis. Eastern Cape residents are living in fear, yet the provincial government continues to treat public safety as an afterthought.
This is not a budget that delivers hope. It is a budget that delivers more of the same: recycled rhetoric, misplaced priorities, and no meaningful shift in how public money is spent. The people of this province are being asked to wait yet again, for jobs, for investment, for functioning schools, and for hospitals that are not death traps.
The DA will continue to fight for a budget that values accountability over excuses, service delivery over cadre deployment, and results over rhetoric. Our people deserve hope, dignity, and the opportunity for a better future, not empty promises.